I'm currently teaching at a school in Thailand, and have been for a year. However I'm considering a change of country - purely because I need to save about $30k USD to fulfill a financial goal. No chance of that ever happening in Thailand, really - certainly not within any reasonable timeframe.

I'd pretty much crossed China off the list as I thought wages and thus savings potential were low there - pretty much like Thailand, you'll earn enough to live day to day and have a decent time, but it's difficult to save money. However I've been doing some research over the last week and it looks like I might have been a bit hasty in that assumption. Plus my qualifications/experience (1 year exp, BA degree, but no TEFL certificate) won't be enough for a year in the middle east, so I'm limited to Asia. Plus I don't really want to go to the desert ever, even in the future.

So, to a few questions...

1) I've read on here standard prices for private lessons are 200 RMB an hour. That's roughly double the standard price in Thailand. Is this sort of work easy to come by? Let's say I got a typical 16 hour a week uni job - how many hours of private lessons could I reasonably get to fill that schedule out? I'm trying to decide between a low paid/low hours uni job and a high paid/high hours job in a school or training centre...and the big question is whether private students are easy to come by which would mean taking the low hours job would be better.

2) Kinda related to the above point - is it actually easy to get private students to make the most of the time off you have? For example if you do 16 hours teaching a week, you're going to end up with a lot of free time when a lot of potential private students are either at school or work. If it's difficult to actually fill the day hours (but easy to fill evenings and weekends), surely you might be best off working a typical 25 hours teaching/15 hours office time job, then cramming in privates after work and at weekends?

3) In terms of savings, is it best to go to the big cities or the small ones? Does the slightly higher pay and perhaps more opportunity for private students outweigh the general increased costs of living there? Assume I'm prepared to live a pretty barebones lifestyle (i.e. a room, food, and decent internet are essentials, stuff like going out getting pissed will only happen once a month at most, and given I'm saving towards a goal I wouldn't be blowing my money on wining and dining Chinese girls).

That gives me 18500 RMB a month and a free apartment. Subtract 3000 RMB for general cost of living expenses (is this doable? Never been to China but I'm sure food can't cost much and the rent will be paid already).

Gives savings of 15500 RMB a month, or $2500 USD. Multiply that by 12 months, and I'll have hit my $30k USD goal.

Given this is for a 31 hour workweek, and I'll also have a whole bunch of uni holidays, on paper this seems pretty doable - hell, it kinda feels like someone who was willing to push themselves and work every hour god sends could do a fair bit better (I am willing to do this for a year, FWIW - the money right now is pretty important to me and in my prior job in a different industry I had a job with extremely long hours and long commute so I know I could do it).

So, say you're willing to work 6 days a week, fill in your schedule as much as possible with privates, and pretty much just stay in your room the times you're not working - does my plan sound achievable?

That gives me 18500 RMB a month and a free apartment. Subtract 3000 RMB for general cost of living expenses (is this doable? Never been to China but I'm sure food can't cost much and the rent will be paid already).

Gives savings of 15500 RMB a month, or $2500 USD. Multiply that by 12 months, and I'll have hit my $30k USD goal.

You can't assume you'll have all this extra money from day one. It takes time, sometimes months, to build up a network of outside work and even when you do it's not going to be 100% reliable or consistent. Scale your goal down by at least 50% and you're closer to reality. If you want or need $30,000 in the first year then find a job with a much higher salary, not a lower paying job that relies on part time work as a supplement.

I've been here in Qingdao about 7 months and really juat getting the opportunity to do privates to any real extent. There are some kindergartens where I could have got some side work earlier on.

I have run a business though and I know a lot of time will be spent on travel and there will be times when there's no money to pay you or a no show. My classes are also in the morning amd the privates are in the evenimg which means a split shift or giving up my weekends which sucks. Decided to skip them for now. I wouldn't count on everything working out your first year. It's a business like any other. It takes time. Second year you can get some more leverage with your school to get a better schedule and you would have had some time to build contacts. Remember also you have to hustle a bit. Some people like that and some hate it.

Definitely a bigger city to do it that way.

Seems like if you want to make more money the first year it's easier to teach at a language school that offers a lot of overtime possibilities.

Right so the general consensus is that it's better to skip uni jobs and go for a higher paying one with higher hours?

If that's the case I'll probably have to pay for my own apartment. What are rental prices like in the big cities? 1 room studio with a bathroom will be fine althouh I don't want to house share, done that before and hated it with a passion.

If you only want to stay here 1 year a single high paying job would allow more savings probably.

Studio apartments can be very hard to find in some places. Check on 58.com or anjuke before you sign the contract if that's a big deal. Or look for one with housing. I think I saw some gigs with decent pay and free housing in inner mongolia but maybe it was teaching kindy.

I would be open to staying in China more than a year (providing I like the place, of course!). And there's not neccesarily a strict deadline for making the cash by (sooner the better though, obviously), I just want to get a general idea of what's possible.

I've read from some that if you're getting your own place you need to pay 6 months rent up front? Any truth to that or are things more reasonable like in every other country? (i.e. 1-2 months up front plus a 1 month security deposit?).

It's 3 months where I live I think. Depends on the area. Room shares don't need much of a deposit here but you've said you're against that.

In smaller cities the rent is so low it's not that big of a deal but I imagine Shanghai or Beijing can be a PITA. one city I've been eying you can rent an apartment for around $100 per month. From other posts here Shanghai might be ten times as expensive.

Again, the norm here is people sharing a 2-3bdrm apartment and there are very few studio apts available in some areas. Would suck to have to rent a 2-3bdrm place in Shanghai or Beijing I would think.

China seems to be a dynamic, fluid, and inefficient market. There seem to be few standards, and information flow among employers is spotty at best. The Chinese seem to be aware of the overall trend towards decreasing salaries and greater demands (primarily a result of supply/demand), but even this is applied inconsistently.

From what little experience I have, I would say that China is a bad place to try to do anything with certainty in a short time. Sometimes you get lucky, but sometimes you need to build up to a 'good job' (in whatever form that takes). On the positive side, this still is a bit of the 'wild east' and I do believe that the savings potential is there for some, in time.

It's going to take some time to build up connections for privates. 3000 RMB is reasonable if you don't foreign stuff all the time and can live off the local swill. Thai beer is way better than Chinese beer.

I'd say you'd reach your goal in two years, barring disasters of course.

If you do privates, factor in travel and doorstep cancellations.
Mom 'n Pop language schools on Sat and Sun are a good bet, as your commute time is standardised and you should be paid even if some of your students don't show.
200RMB per hour unlikely at the M&P places though.
On balance, provided the accom thing is reasonable, a high paying language school chain outlet gives best $$ results from Day One.
Kid Castle, EF, Disney etc seem to be variable as to teacher comfort level.
No doubt OP has seen posts on these.
Make sure you really understand how the exchange rate will murder your RMB savings when you remit them.

I'm currently teaching at a school in Thailand, and have been for a year. However I'm considering a change of country - purely because I need to save about $30k USD to fulfill a financial goal. No chance of that ever happening in Thailand, really - certainly not within any reasonable timeframe.

I'd pretty much crossed China off the list as I thought wages and thus savings potential were low there - pretty much like Thailand, you'll earn enough to live day to day and have a decent time, but it's difficult to save money. However I've been doing some research over the last week and it looks like I might have been a bit hasty in that assumption. Plus my qualifications/experience (1 year exp, BA degree, but no TEFL certificate) won't be enough for a year in the middle east, so I'm limited to Asia. Plus I don't really want to go to the desert ever, even in the future.

So, to a few questions...

1) I've read on here standard prices for private lessons are 200 RMB an hour. That's roughly double the standard price in Thailand. Is this sort of work easy to come by? Let's say I got a typical 16 hour a week uni job - how many hours of private lessons could I reasonably get to fill that schedule out? I'm trying to decide between a low paid/low hours uni job and a high paid/high hours job in a school or training centre...and the big question is whether private students are easy to come by which would mean taking the low hours job would be better.

2) Kinda related to the above point - is it actually easy to get private students to make the most of the time off you have? For example if you do 16 hours teaching a week, you're going to end up with a lot of free time when a lot of potential private students are either at school or work. If it's difficult to actually fill the day hours (but easy to fill evenings and weekends), surely you might be best off working a typical 25 hours teaching/15 hours office time job, then cramming in privates after work and at weekends?

3) In terms of savings, is it best to go to the big cities or the small ones? Does the slightly higher pay and perhaps more opportunity for private students outweigh the general increased costs of living there? Assume I'm prepared to live a pretty barebones lifestyle (i.e. a room, food, and decent internet are essentials, stuff like going out getting pissed will only happen once a month at most, and given I'm saving towards a goal I wouldn't be blowing my money on wining and dining Chinese girls).

That gives me 18500 RMB a month and a free apartment. Subtract 3000 RMB for general cost of living expenses (is this doable? Never been to China but I'm sure food can't cost much and the rent will be paid already).

Gives savings of 15500 RMB a month, or $2500 USD. Multiply that by 12 months, and I'll have hit my $30k USD goal.

Given this is for a 31 hour workweek, and I'll also have a whole bunch of uni holidays, on paper this seems pretty doable - hell, it kinda feels like someone who was willing to push themselves and work every hour god sends could do a fair bit better (I am willing to do this for a year, FWIW - the money right now is pretty important to me and in my prior job in a different industry I had a job with extremely long hours and long commute so I know I could do it).

So, say you're willing to work 6 days a week, fill in your schedule as much as possible with privates, and pretty much just stay in your room the times you're not working - does my plan sound achievable?

You're plan as described is largely what I have been doing for several years do - with two modifications - Number 1 - these days 200 is on the lowside, especially if you have to travel, these days I would ask 250 if they come to me, 300 for traveling, 2 hour minimum. Your 2nd problem comes with getting enough privates to hit your 15 hours a week. Hard to do when you're new on the scene, Word of mouth needs time. I found one golden student who kept introducing friends, but, finding such is very much hit and miss.

On the plus side your estimation for a university wage strikes me as conservative.

The best place to do what you describe is maybe ShenZhen, or the university town in GuangZhou - IMO

Alright, cheers everyone. Looks like a higher hours/higher paying job is the way to go then. Something like a kindergarten or a language chain.

Got a couple more questions now that it seems I'll be working more a 9-5 type job, and also as people have pointed out, setting up my own private lessons might take time.

1) In Thailand, after the kids finish school, they often go to language centres afterwards for a few hours - with the result that there's quite a few language centres here, and evening/weekend work is relatively easy to get in these places. Certainly a lot more easy than sourcing your own private students, although the pay isn't generally as good. Are there lots of these language centres in China where one could feasibly pick up evening work after the normal 9-5 (or 8-4, whatever) shift has finished? Since that, as already pointed out, would give more reliable income and there'd be less initial downtime (i.e. I could probably walk into a number of language centres in my first week and find some work within the month, whereas a steady stream of privates might take much longer to come by).

2) If there is a fair amount of evening work avaliable at these places, what is the typical rate per hour? Assuming we're in a big city here, not a tiny village no one has heard of.

3) Non Sequitur, you mention the exchange rate murdering savings. Can you give some more information on this as I'm not sure what you mean? Right now it's about 10 RMB = 1 GBP, and as I'm originally from the UK it's GBP that's important to me. I've got a bank account in the UK that doesn't charge fees on foreign transactions...is there some other hidden 'cost' of exchanging RMB to GBP? I've read some posts that say wiring large amounts out of China is an issue, but posts from some other also stated they never had any problems. I figure as GBP is a 'popular' currency, I should have no problem exchanging RMB to GBP in China if needbe at a money exchange place anyway? Then just stick the cash in the bank when I get home.

My point is that your RMB account seems huge and then when you get the fruit of your labours home, you find that you've been working here for very little.
Make sure you identify all the costs on your first remittance.
Wasn't alluding to any hidden fish hooks though.
Best

When I moved to Shanghai, yes the housing was higher but so was the amount of available side work. I could work an extra 40 hours a month in side work if I wanted but I want to enjoy my life. I found private students through some of the dreaded recruiters most people don't like but I spread myself around to several of them so I can be picky. I get calls every day from them asking if I want Job A,B, or C. They know my minimums (250 hour if I don't travel far...300 if I do with 2 hour minimums and weekly payments). Do they call me and ask about lower paying jobs? Of course they do....I just reject them and move on.

In short, you could save that kind of money and get started fairly quickly in one of the large cities. But you might have to work your butt off. In Shanghai you can find small one bedroom flats for 3000-5000 in decent areas. Three months upfront plus deposit and agency fee (if you use one). I just found an area I wanted to live in and walked into one of the dozens of agencies lining the street and had them do the work for me. Was worth the extra money to me.

My wife (not Chinese)did as you suggested in your first post. She took a uni job with a 2 day schedule and loaded up on privates the other days. She actually had the privates set up before she even landed here but she is way more organized than me.